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This is the Work Smart Hypnosis Podcast, session number 181 Alan Barski on Hypnotic Self Care. Welcome to the Work Smart Hypnosis Podcast with Jason Lynette, your professional resource for hypnosis training and outstanding business success. Here’s your host, Jason Lynette. Hey there, and welcome back.
It’s Jason Lynette here with an incredible session one that I’ve actually been meaning to record here for quite some time and only took us 181 attempts to, to get it right. Uh, I’ve known of Alan Bar’s work for many years now, having first interacted with Michael Elner and then finally getting a chance to meet and hang.
Alan over at the Hypno Thoughts Live Convention and, uh, actually back here in my office, it’s early September as I’m recording this, uh, though he and I recorded this conversation just prior to the HT Live Convention, and we’re gonna hit on some incredible themes of stories of working with clients, aspects of teaching your clients.
Um, he does a beautiful job of encapsulating something that I define as. We can either do hypnosis or become hypnotic. So some real workable content. And so just some real interesting stories as someone who clearly is a worker and a real thinker in this profession. Having seen thousands of clients having first jumped into all of this many years ago and just.
Very clearly someone who gets the work is passionate about the work that he does, and, uh, you’re gonna hear that incredible dialogue here in this conversation here with Alan, which you can check out his website [email protected]. That’s. M a r i n as in the city that’s near San Francisco, I believe geography is not my strength.
Uh, links and details over at the show notes [email protected]. And while you’re there to check out hypnotic workers.com, that’s the all access pass to my hypnosis training library. Everything from rethinking the process from the ground up, how we talk about hypnosis, how we do hypnosis, but more specifically how we workshop the process and build it to be what the client needs.
When they need it. Everything even down to real client sessions, which thank to some waivers. Clients have agreed to have their real sessions fully documented and transcribed inside of my online library. You’re able to get instant access to this resource [email protected], starting at just $47. So check that out, hypnotic workers.com.
And with that, let’s jump directly into this outstanding conversation here with a wonderful practitioner. This is session number 181. Alan Barsky on Hypnotic Selfcare.
Um, for me, I, I was, uh, I was working in the advertising industry, writing radio and television commercials, mostly at that time. And three friends of mine who actually didn’t know each other all tried to. Convinced me that I should move into hypnotherapy. They, they said I had the voice. They said, I, I seem to be doing therapy with my clients.
And, and that that was something that I could do. Um, a as I age, I, I, I want to work. I love working. I love the things that I do of, I’ve loved my jobs and I, and I wanna do things, you know, up until I’m in my eighties. And that hypnotherapy was that thing to do. And I actually did meet somebody at the time who said they did go to a hypnotherapist.
And I know it’s a joke about, he said, Yeah, the famous Ala Penske famous novel Valley hypnotherapist, he went to see him. He was 86, 85, and and he said, You will fall asleep. You’ll fall asleep in. And eight fell asleep and . But I love that story because it said yes. I continue growing and learning and working and doing and being connected to all that is all around me, um, all the way through my life and, and I’ve always looked for, for that sort of thing to do.
Yeah. So that initial entry point, that initial, let’s call it curiosity, what were, what were your next steps from there in terms of getting that in motion? Well, they all tricked me. They all had a little trick for me. Yeah. One of them, Steve, Steve Erman, he’s a comedian. He, he actually had a gig at, um, International Chemotherapy, um, Federation, down Shelley Stockwell, and he said, Hey, Alan.
Um, I got, I got a gig this weekend doing my comedy show. I need an assistant. Why don’t you come down with me? We’ll drive down to LA we’ll have a good time. I’m in San Francisco, Northern California, by the way, and, uh, we’ll have a good time and I have a special suite for you, and you’ll be my assistant and you’ll have a lot of fun.
I said, Okay. So we get down there and sure enough, he had a nice place for me to, to be, and that’s Thursday night, you know, conference is Friday. And he goes, Darn. You know, I, I really decided I don’t want an assistant here on my thing. I’ve got my comedy show down. Um, why don’t you just hang on a hypnotherapy conference and, um, You know, it’d be a good time this weekend.
I said, Okay, so. Okay, so I got onto the lobby and there are about five guys standing around in, in the lobby on, in a circle, and they were telling jokes and they looked like they were, might be hypno this. And I kind of move over to that circle and the jokes kind of went around. And then when it came down to me, well I had a joke and then.
Sure it’s soon. They all thought I was a presenter and all of a sudden I had friends and I had people I knew, and I’m in the hypnotherapy conference and, and I loved it. I was just so fascinated by it. I just fascinated and at the end of the conference, I at Peter Blum’s running the bookstore, and I go, Okay, Peter, I’m gonna choose one book.
You’re gonna, I’m only gonna buy one book, one book here that, that I’m gonna really explore this hypnotherapy thing. And he says, Come back in two hours. I come back in two hours and he hands me a tape. By Orman, Miguel. Mm-hmm. , Shelly Stockwell interviewing Orman Miguel. And when I got home, I played that tape and I just sunk right in.
I, I just heard what Orman Miguel had to teach and had to share. And I knew I was gonna study with this guy, and the tape was in Colorado and apparently he was in Colorado. And I looked him up and it turned out the school he was working with is one freeway stop away from my house. nice. And I, I jumped in and I learned.
And I learned and I just, I loved it. And, and, and, and, and that’s how I started into the hypnotherapy business there. And, and I still was doing the advertising. My other friend says, Hey listen, you’re gonna eventually lose this big account cuz that’s how advertising works and you have to promise me you’re gonna do hyno therapy the day you, the day you lose that.
He was, it’s a positive suggestion That was doing good. And that was like eight months later, you know? And sure enough, eight o’clock in the morning, boom, there it goes. That’s how it works. And, um, I remember my promise and I called theist and I became an assistant to him. He, he was doing crowds. He was doing new, new life.
Um, Uh, new life clinics and you hit ties, 50 people at a time in a room to quit smoking and lose weight, and then you sell them tapes and mm-hmm. and I remember being there and, and I, and we’re in this auditorium. I’ve never done this right. I’ve just graduated school, but I’ve never actually done much hypnotherapy and.
And I’m counting, I’m going 2024. That’s 40 44. And then err, there is 60 people in the audience. How are we gonna empathize 60 people at once? And he goes, Hey, just follow me. We’ll be fine. And then again, boom, there it was. And I saw that happen. Then I heard the changes that happened and, and I worked with him for a while and started private practice.
And at the beginning I was used to, you know, 50 people at once. So I had to really slow it down and calm down and just treat each person more quietly. Yeah. So I’m curious to ask then, and I love that aspect of jumping into it right away. I, I chair the quick through line that it was kind of, It was a hobby.
It was an interest of mine. And then deciding that, Okay, let me get a little bit more formal with this. I was kind of already doing a, a stage hypnosis show at the time, almost just by memory, uh, just by memorizing the words and hoping it works. And, uh, the decision of, well, let me find someone local and, Oh, I keep finding this guy Sean, Michael Andrews.
Oh, he’s doing a training three miles from my. Oh, he lives here. Oh, okay. . So call it the, the synchronicity or whatever you want to call it, of just right place at the right time though. Um, chat with me about that, that moment the universe is conspiring in your favor. Exactly. Or, uh, map quest at the time. So looking at it from working initially with these groups, what would you say were some of those takeaways of working with those groups that you were able to bring nowadays into working with the one to.
First I could do it. Yeah. I, I could do it second. People got a lot out of it. Mm-hmm. third. I could read people, I could read people that, you could see people in the audience, and I could just tell who was a smoker, who was there to lose weight, Who, who was doing both no matter what. Even if they lied to me sometimes they’d say, Oh, I’m just here to lose weight and look at them and go, You’re also a smoker.
I could see it. Um, It’s kind of like when you’re a teacher and I’ve been a high school teacher, and you look around the room and you can just see, you know, the kid in the back of the room. They think you can’t see him, but you see everything from that place. And, and, and for me it’s, it’s an intimate conversation with, with each client.
Um, I, I’m content based. I, I, I like hearing the story. I like hearing where the people are coming from. I want to hear it. I wanna know more about this person, and I establish this personal relationship on a one-to-one with each person. And, and I’m helpful. I, I am. I’m, I’m doing a good job. I’m a good boy here.
My, my Yelp reviews are all five stars. And, and when I walk just in my life here in my county and in my town, you know, every once in a while somebody will say, Thank you. And, and I’ll go, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That just feels really good. That kind of, that, that kind of, um, acknowledgement. Well, I love that as a theme of, you know, there’s a trend and I may be one of the ones guilty of popularizing this too, amongst many others, of getting more into the context that the content doesn’t matter so much when the content does matter.
We do need some of that story. We do need some of that background and, you know, what specific challenges may have been there. Um, what is it about that initial interaction of getting into that content that you found to be so? Well, well first it’s my clientele. Um, I’m in the county. Um, we’re the second worst county for smoking in the country if you’re Iist.
Mm-hmm. , In other words, hardly anybody smokes cigarettes here. And so that’s off the table. And so for the most part, every once in a while, of course, people come to me for anxiety. They come to me for anxiety, and their anxiety is based around about, you know, their, their job. They have a certain amount of employees or maybe they’re an independent person there, or, or, They’re doing something really important.
There’s a lot of interesting jobs out here and say they’re in the movie industry and they’ve been the second cameraman for a while, and suddenly they promoted to first cameraman and and they suddenly have to start, you know, before they were just dealing with technical people. Now they have to talk to the suits in the, in the conference room and, and they’re a little nervous and, and you know, they.
The, the context of, of where they are and, and why they’re nervous and what they have to do and change in that process makes a difference. Mm-hmm. So, so I, I do that kind of a situation. Yeah. Are there certain, I’m curious to ask that, are there certain trends that tend to pop up working with those communi.
Well, well, I used, I used to specialize in weight loss cuz in advertising, I had actually worked with 20 different weight loss organizations over the years and I, I, I, I kinda knew what I was doing there and, and, and people wanted weight loss and, and, but more and more anxiety in the last. Four or five years.
It’s anxiety’s the issue. Anxiety, anxiety and mindfulness has popped up more. And, and, and also, um, Michael and I did these, um, Michael Elner and I did these medical support hypnosis, um, certifications. And of course, so I’m connecting, connecting continually to the medical community. About a third of my clients, maybe more of these days, come directly from, um, doctors.
Uh, natural pass or medical doctors, and they have clients who are, are going through terrible anxiety depending on what their issue is. There’s a come, people send me people and they have heavy, heavy issues, and sometimes they’re at the end of life and you’re helping them with white coat syndrome. They have to go see a doctor so many times that, um, they, they just are afraid of the actual treatments.
And so you help them inside that context. Of course, just find themself again, remember who they are and get them centered into where they are. They’re more than their, um, diagnosis. Their, their, and you put them in that human, help them get to that human place, and, and then they’re able to process it. Um, the downside is, is that, um, when you deal with serious folks that, um, you know, um, that sometimes, um, they pass on and that’s not, um, and that’s hard to take.
Mm-hmm. , um, um, so, so I’m meant to helping people find out who they are. Yes. Um, I, I do a good cold read on people. I use something called an engram with a lot of other people. Don’t seem to process, but I, it’s just one system to help me do a cold read on somebody to help them understand them better. So no matter who you’re coming to see me for, I’m gonna be writing down not just what your weak points are, what your problem points are, what are your strengths, what are your strengths, and, and I’m gonna write that down.
And then by the second session, I’m gonna be feeding back to you. Information about yourself. Information you, you might have forgotten, information you might know, but hadn’t really appreciated or information you might not have known at all. And I can find someone who’s ethical and reliable and productive and idealistic and fair and honest.
And, and, and these kinds of traits have. Helped and gotten them in trouble throughout their life, as it always does. And when I, when I inside that trans place that we help people go to, I, I can, I can put them into context, grow with trees. Deeply appreciate yourself. Deeply appreciate yourself for this, this, and this.
And since it’s on authentic thing, not just, you’ll feel self-confident, but no deeply appreciate yourself for the times you, you’ve really been idealistic and you know, and you can’t be perfect and, and or you’ve been self-disciplined or, and it’s on authentic part of who they are. And they feel seen and they feel heard.
And when I hear those words, I am seen, I felt seen, I felt heard. I know I’m on track. I, I know we’re doing the things that make the difference in their life. Now I do something called the the seven life changing. Um, Sessions for adjustment to adult life and cuz I think this is what it is we’re adjusting is adult life.
And, and I get, I get, that’s where I get my young people 20 to 25 and, and, and help them process, Who are you? Who are you on this planet? Who are you in yourself? Who are you in your body? What does it mean to be you? Where are your strengths? Since I help them find their strengths and their real strengths.
Oh, they, they feel that that welling up of, of who I. Yeah. Is there a story that comes to mind of working with a client that really helps to, you know, put this all in perspective of how it is that you are, you know, tapping into who that person is, what drives them, and using that as that catalyst for change?
Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yes, Yes. Who’s they? Who they authentically are with, with things they really care about? Mm-hmm. . Um, if somebody, sometimes you get an artistic type of person here and they’re deep into their sorrow, and, and then you get to show them how. Wait, wait, wait. That, that sadness that you’re into, there’s a difference between sadness and depression.
Depression is not good. Sadness is good. Sadness is good. It means you love something so deeply. that you don’t have or want or lost, and that, that, that is part of your, in this, these particular groups of folks, that is part of your creative process, right? They, they think, Oh, I’m never gonna, you haven’t you always gotten out of that sadness part, But yes, and that’s the point.
You will get out of that sadness part. That is your creative process. This is the time when you are most creative. This is the time to delve into your art. This is the time to really put yourself into that. Sometimes they, they feel sad and then they don’t do the artwork and it’s the opposite. Put ’em into the artwork and then suddenly they create this beautiful piece and, and they realize that that’s part of their creative process and their personality.
Yeah. Is there a story of working with a specific client that. Kind of highlights that for you? Yeah, like lots of them. I, I, no, they all do. No, no. There is no one client that stands up for any one thing. There’s large groups of people who have different personalities that I address along those contexts that allow them to really express themselves.
So, so I’ve been doing this one thing here. Um, I am come in and, and so. Just about everybody. If they’re even a little bit, Well, I say, Okay, all right. Here’s a way of thinking, um, that will be very helpful for what we do. Whether they picking their nails, whatever, you know, thing they’re trying to get rid of or change.
Um, There’s a body, mind, and consciousness or a body, mind and spirit. You know, I’ve heard a body in mind and you’ve read on my website. Now, this is a body, mind, spirit or consciousness. And then we have to figure out what word fits with you if they’re religious, body, mind, soul. Um, but just about everybody is there.
And I say, Listen, if you. And when they’re not, then I don’t do this. I just do body mind. Um, but if you think of yourself, if you just think of yourself in this context, all the work that we do will go better. Okay? So there’s a body, and then I take my hands out and I shake my arms and I show, you know, breaking arm.
And you’re still okay. And, and, and there’s, there’s your mind. But really your mind is your servant. It works for you. Your mind is like your body. It, it’s this body of yours. Not you. This body is yours. This body is not you. This body is yours. Same thing with your mind. Mine is yours is not you. You is that whatever that living being thing is inside yourself, however you see it.
and, and people seem to relate to that. Um, yeah, I love that. And, and to kind of, to kind of branch that off into some of the themes of what you’ve referenced that you mentioned, you know, the experience of working with so much advertising in the weight loss industries. How, how would you say that prepared you for working with clients one to one on weight loss?
Oh my God. Well, you can see people who are heavy or people who have. Big, bulky, something hanging on to them. And they’re not heavy, they just have this extra weight. You can see in some guys a particular, a big giant belly and it’s, it’s from, it’s from cortisol. It’s from such fear. Um, it’s cortisol. It feels you can just go in there and you can think we could cut across the dotted line and, and they’re just carrying this heavy weight and carrying this heavy baggage.
And when you start seeing this body is your, is not you. When you see it as you, you get all these emotions around, Oh, I ate too much. I did the wrong thing, I did this, I did that. But when you see it as yours, you suddenly go, Wait, I have to take care of it. I take, you take your car in for an oil change, you change the tires, you take care of it, and the process shifts in their mind.
This, this is mine, not me. A lot of the emotions come out of there and a lot of the self care comes in. My goal is to set you up with a program of. Care and you take care of that self-care all day long. You don’t just come into the office here and then we do our little magic and hopefully you’ll play the recordings.
But, but in addition to that, in addition to that, I want you throughout the day, you know, quantum focusing. I was very honored and privileged to co co-write the quantum focusing series of Michael Elner. Yes. Um, and, and the process that he developed and oh my God, it just, The process for me and my clients here is, it’s wherever you are.
Mm-hmm. , it’s when you leave the office, then what kind of hypnosis do you put yourself into? It’s, it’s when they call you in for a meeting, you know, how do you get yourself ready If you, when you have to make a presentation, what do you do in that five minutes to get yourself in that right place? It’s throughout the day when you take a walk.
You know, watch yourself walking when you walk through the woods. Remember who you are. You’re in this constant interchange. Um, A breath. He throwing breath. And, and you know, when you breathe, you know, it’s, we’re in this interchange and um, around here it’s very woodsy and a lot of trees and people walking, you know, and, and you breathing the oxygen and you breath out carbon, the oxide and the trees, they breathing carbon, the oxide, and they breathe out oxygen.
And you are nature. You are nature. You’re in this interchange with nature and you are one with nature. And, and that breathing and that interchange and attaching breath, attaching breath. Powerful things that you can do throughout the day and the quantum focusing process, uh, which is getting into this state, uh, the zone in which you are here and the here and now, and, and processes around that make a difference.
Breathing on purpose. I call it breathing on purpose. And it gives you that control and, and people change their lives from that process. Did I answer your question? No, it does. That does, and especially these themes. You know, bringing the mindfulness into the work that it’s, it’s the work that happens often when they leave the process.
Not just what happens in the room. The room is what can plant the seed and get a lot of that movement and motion, but then to have those skills necessary to keep up that, To keep up that self care. Yeah. Yeah. That, and that to me is the, Well, is in addition really important? I think people, I look around and I see people mostly in a days sleepwalking.
They, you know, are they here to become hypnotized? You already are hypnotized. Yeah. Um, you already are hypnotized or hypnotized by the media. You ized by your parents as you grew up. You tz by the media every time you watch television and you hypnotize yourself when you sit in a corner. Ask, say, say negative things to yourself when you come here, What I wanna do is de hypnotize you.
Yes. To wake you up so that you’re alive and, and aware and in the here and now and you’re part of life, and to break out of that thing. Um, I, I want it to be everywhere that you are. So I think that’s, um, that’s an important part of the processes. As well. Yeah. So, to look at some of these strategies, some of these self-care techniques, uh, is there an example you can share in terms of something that someone can put into action themselves?
Um, example, Uh, well, I, I mean, I, I would take them in, you know, into the, um, well, you know, I would take them into, uh, refocusing. Mm-hmm. , Um, yeah, I, So it’s called quantum focusing, but it’s really a matter of refocusing. Yes. Um, don’t look at this, Look at. Oh, are you looking at a negative thing? No, refocus. Look at the thing that’s gonna be helpful and useful, helpful and useful.
Specific example I, I guess would be maybe in, in, in, um, what do you do with thoughts? What do you do with thoughts so you can control your mind? What do you do with a negative thought? What do you do with a positive thought? Um, Orman MCGI talks about right knowledge, wrong knowledge, imagination, sleep and memory.
And we think about just the thoughts. There’s, there’s. There, there’s a place in your mind for for right knowledge that’s positive thinking, defined by helpful and useful. Helpful and useful. Hmm. And those thoughts go into your action, part of your mind. Um, now a negative thought, that’s something that’s not helpful, not useful.
You don’t have to resist that anymore. You don’t have to resist that. There’s a part of your mind that holds that. Um, you know how a negative thought sometimes seems like a block of ice. You chip at it and chip at it still there, but turns out the part of your mind, the no action part of your mind, it’s a little bit warmer.
You put that negative thought in there, it melts and evaporates, and all your action will be from the action part of your mind, and you will just let go of the no action part of your. , which I love that, of acknowledging where it’s not. You know, so often we’d see techniques that are trying to ignore that negative thought or, um, inadvertently by accident, you know, often get to the place of shining that spotlight on that negative thought.
But just that place of acknowledgement that the same way one thought can exist, the other thought can exist the same way. It’s the matter of which one do you now put to use? Exactly, Exactly. Cuz we’re all thinking, both things. Resist and persist. There’s, there’s some phrase there. Um, I find people are mostly time traveling when they start talking about, you know, um, oh, they’re worrying about the future.
They’re regretting the past, worrying about the future, regretting the past. Hey, you’re time traveling. Look around you. There is, you’re only in the here and now. You’re only in the here and now, and there’s plenty going on here. You’ve been in my office for 15 minutes. The earth is revolving around, um, is, is revolving at a thousand miles an hour.
That means you’ve already, the both of us have already gone 250 miles. . We’re, we’re not even in the same place anymore. . So, so being in the here and now is the process of the mindfulness of being. Meaning here, and you know, if they’re fearful, and I show how fear works on the body. It’s part of, you know, animals chasing us in the past.
And I put little dots on ’em, little bio dots, and they can see their, um, um, um, their shift and their relaxing or their nervousness or their calming down move with the color of the dots and. And I make them look around. No, there’s, there’s, there’s no, there’s no line chasing us. And I show them a graph and I act that little skit on, on a line chasing you in your past.
And we’re the ones who survived and, and where fear comes from. And that’s the only place fear comes from. We don’t have a place for where your boss yells at you, the fear that wells up in your body. Also you, uh, is, is um, is coming from an animal chasing you. We’re right now just developing that new process of how to sort a thing and coming back to the, the here the only place and, and there’s strange now.
And even when I started this very sentence, that’s the past, that’s the mystery. Allowing yourself to fall into that mystery of life without even having to understand it. I think the secret is allowing yourself to be. In that mystery that just open yourself up to all the possibilities that come with that.
Yeah. Yeah. Well, I’ve, I love the phrasing of coming out of that hypnotic state and into a better one, or into the reality that actually is, is around them. You know, I know the work that you mentioned before with, with Michael Elner, working with people, uh, dealing with disease, dealing with major. Illness. Um, ha having gone through that, I mean, is there something that’s come from that to, to now approach the client coming in and I hate to use the phrasing, but, uh, more of that quote, normal everyday issue of something that’s making them anxious.
Something that’s making them fearful of having gone through, you know, working with people with catastrophic illness to now here’s this scenario that you know isn’t quite as terminal. Well, yeah. Um, I’m gonna take it down a pathway and develop a safe place in their own mind. Mm-hmm. a place where they can go and they can do work.
A place. When they go home and they listen to the recordings of what we just did, they’re gonna first put themself into that safe place. and inside that safe place will do the work. And inside that process, then we’re going to give ’em, um, ways to get rid of excess emotions. I explain about storyline. You know how the story affects the body.
You take out a lemon, I keep a lemon here, uh, cutting it open. You take the bite, they, they pretend to take a bite. They pretend to take a bite. Sometimes they take a bite, there’s a real lemon and everybody makes a face and they get to see immediate. That their thoughts are processing their body. So, so throughout the process, I’m showing them that this body is yours and that their mind and thoughts are processing their body through the bio doubt, through, through the biting of the lemon, through, um, through the different things that they do.
Um, I think for examples, but I’m, I’m, I’m really careful about, uh, um, confidentiality. Oh, absolutely. And so it’s just really important just by the nature of where my place is, I deal with sometimes some famous people, um, who are, uh, you know, on television or, uh, um, in the music industry, um, uh, or who are doing incredible things in the tech industry.
And, uh, and so I find it fascinating too. And one of the big reasons I think, I like the story part is people have such interesting jobs. I always think I’d love that job for a while. Oh, I would love, and I pretend, Okay, I am in your. When, when they come to see me, I am in your job. How would I handle this?
How would I handle these things going? Um, cuz I was in business for a while, once I had a company with 45 employees, um, knock on wood, that was, that worked out really well. Um, I’m able to help people. How do you handle certain employee situations? How do you handle the communication with the people that are working under you?
Um, how do you handle certain clients who might be messing with you? Um, not paying bills. Sometimes this comes into the action. We get into kind of a business consulting. A about a third of my people are coming to me, they’ve got a business, and, and we do sometime in the, in the business consulting process, how to get people to pay your bill.
And from Detroit we have to learn really early how to get people to pay. So, um, so I think that allows me to, to, to really dig deeper in the world and also to to work with them in the context of. Of what their real problems are, what, what are they really facing on a daily basis? Yeah. And it’s where, again, in certain industries there’s some insights and not, not to bring it to an extreme negative, but I had a, an instant rapport moment with a lawyer years ago where the issue was anxiety is around public speaking and I.
Found a found my most positive way to phrase that. Well, this is an interesting scenario because everybody in a firm is kind of in a cutthroat position because they’re moving from being the sub tractor to, uh, partner. Um, and if you don’t get it, they will. So you’re into the environment where I get to say to everybody else, Oh, people in the audience want you to succeed, yet you’re in a situation where people don’t want you to succeed.
And the guy pauses and. Oh, you get lawyers, um, having, That’s good. That’s good. Jason. Ha. Having come from a community of, uh, working in theater many years ago and similar aspects of, you know, what is that creative mindset? What is that creative ability that they have and how do we use that to, again, dissociate out of that hypnotic state that they’ve created?
And into that more resourceful state. And sometimes it is just, um, you know, I, I pulled from Michael as well. The, the mindset of, uh, moments of intention that here’s something where you’re actually in the moment of, you know, practicing self hypnotic techniques and, uh, moments of transition to recenter.
Yeah. To recenter or refocus. It’s, it’s bringing yourself back, choosing this thought, not that. Uh, we have a little basketball practice where we show people how to shoot basketball and I include it with every client and they think what I need is for, and it’s, it’s to visually think of yourself shooting baskets.
Um, and, and when I taught high school at juvenile halls to break teams up and have them shoot. Basketball for 15 minutes, you know, play against each other, teams’ A and B. And then I take team A and I’d bring him into a room and I’d visual do the visual quantum focusing thing, which I got permission, and which later changed the mindfulness, of course, when that became accepted by the prison authorities to teach them the mindfulness way.
And then the other team would just practice more and then send them out. And the A team would always beat the B team, the one who spent its time visualizing. So I say, okay. This is what the basketball’s about. You know, teach your kids basketball. It’s good for all kinds of sports, but also when you walk through your office throughout the day, pretend that you have like a tiny basketball in your hand.
And every time you say a waist basket, you imagine yourself standing, cing, visualizing, shooting the ball. Woo. Seeing that ball go right into the basket, to the waist basket. You know, I. That ball shooting into the basket with a happy, hard piece of mind, playful spirit. I see the basket going through and I can do this whenever I want.
And so, you know, people have said, I walk through the office now and, and I shoot like 10 baskets a day, and that just reenters me, refocuses me, puts me into that mindfulness place throughout the day in a very simple way. And it physically coordinates you as. Well, what’s beautiful about that and you know, some of the themes out of the Hope Coaching book that you know, to, to take it away from something you have to stop and do, to take it out of the context of something where someone could easily go, I just haven’t had time to do that.
Here are the these mindful hypnosis approaches that they can do while they’re walking, while they’re working, while they’re right, right. Cooking, while they’re exercising, whatever it. Right, right, right. Um, there, there’s this song, um, by Sophie Tucker, Um, where it goes,
hear this often, the distance, We’ll, we’ll reference it in the show notes. Oh, okay. The point is, it’s wherever you are. Yes. That’s where I think the mindfulness really makes a difference. I describe mindfulness as you walking through a room and you don’t bump into.
You know how many times people walk through and they bumping their things, Mindfulness, you don’t bump into things, you pay attention. You’re breathing on purpose. The center yourself, you’re processing these little techniques throughout yourself. You’re reminding yourself of your strengths. You walk with harmony, poise, grace, and the outside world changes.
And that somehow forces me back to the mindset of dealing with actors like 15 years ago of going, No, you cannot fully be in the moment, otherwise you’d fall off the.
Oh yeah. I saw Stevie Wonder once, uh, um, when the guy he lost tra was holding onto him by his belt. He was shaking. He was a good, Oh, I just lost track and boom. That was just horrible. Yeah. So, so yeah, as acting, you’re just recreating life. I, I mean, we are making this life up. We are making up everything. We think everything comes from only what we already know.
Everything you process in the room that you’re in is based on what you think is important. That pan, that thing that this, it relates to whatever your experience is. So when you’re acting it, it’s you’re taking on, I guess somebody’s, whatever the character is, false staff or whatever, whoever you’re acting through.
And that’s really life. And you write your own script and you create your own play and then you direct it and you go out there and, and then if you decide to play fall staff in that play, then you sing, you know, over an ale. Or if you decide to be a more morro character, you, you play that one and you get to change that script.
Yeah. Is acting, weren’t you really doing a setup or getting yourself into the hypnosis field? Well, I was actually the one behind the scenes, the wizard behind the curtain as the stage manager. But it was that mindset too, of juggling all these unique personalities and it’s where, you know, as I, as I teach other hypnotists about their business, it’s that statement that you do get to go into every room and you have one of the most interesting jobs of anybody there, though I’m.
In the Washington DC area, and I’m hearing you mentioning, Yeah, I work with people who are well known, or here’s the, here’s the politician, here’s the, uh, celebrity, here’s the actor, here’s the speaker who finds their way into some sort of challenge and finds their way here as a mechanism to get out of it.
A and again, it’s where using those strengths. Um, so let, let me ask you from this perspective, somebody’s now. In the space with you to actually do the work? What’s, what’s kind of that user experience is how that process will typically go with you? I really, it’s a little different for everybody. Yes. And well, and you know, there is one thing, well, , even though it’s not now a couple years ago, um, cuz I’m in the tech world here, um, I had set up in my office, um, uh, a three, three dimensional virtual reality.
System where I had a nine foot screen. Well, my client set this up. He did this work. He had. Computers and he gave it to me for that eight months. He had a, we had a nine foot visual screen and he had a 3D projection of, um, Tinkerbell that was left over from a project. And we put the glasses. When somebody would walk in the office, we’d put the glasses on him and then we had him dance.
It was an incredible, uh, process where, where if you move forward Tinker Bell, you would dance with Tinker Bell. You move to the left, she moves to the left with you, and you get to dance with Tinker Bell and you spend about three minutes. Dancing and this 3D projection where she and you are following each other’s movements, and I’d say, Okay, now sit down, , turn that off.
And then we go to work, which is of course the one thing they expect in a hypnosis. Oh yeah. Well, yeah. There’s nothing about anything that you would expect here in my office and they immediately being trans, when you walk into my office, I have a, I have a, uh, I guess just about three and a half foot, four foot, uh, pirate chip, uh, in the air coming out from the ceiling.
Mm-hmm. . And, uh, that stuffs over from a play cuz they’re friends with the people in the play. And, and I have this garden and, and so sometimes I will take them, like if it’s a teenager for. We go for a walk in the garden and as we walk in the garden and we cross the Japanese bridge and across the fish pond, I make up these stories and, and I relate to whatever her problem is.
Let’s say IBS was, was the last person and she had ibs. And as we wind around through the space and the garden, and I would really talk about her winding, uh, digestive system. You know, and pass by the waterfall and how that’s how it’s supposed to go inside your digestive system and then wind it through.
And then when she sits down, she’s already gone through the process, already gone through the hypnosis, already noses and felt inside her own body that this irritable bowel syndrome issue is like nature. And she got to walk inside her own body. So, So I, I, I don’t know if I answered your question there. No, I love that.
Uh, it’s, it, it’s the willingness to reach beyond the, just sit down, close your eyes, listen to my words, and it kind of back to those themes of the hope coaching of how do we activate the process? How do we, you know, get it to be something that they can replicate on themselves to, uh, promote, you know, that, that, that inner healing, that more effectiveness.
Oh, well, the hope coaching is just phenomenal. I mean, you have people like Kelly Woods. Roger Moore and, and on and on. But people are really interested, client centered in making sure that the client is taken care of in, in really beautiful ways and, and listening to what the client wants. So yeah, it’s just an amazing network of, of really amazing people.
And, um, and so that’s the thing. You keep asking me for an example, but I don’t have an example unless you sit down in front of me and then we go to work, and then I’ll create an example. Um, I guess it’s that willingness, it’s that willingness to experiment. It’s that willingness to be in the moment in that mindful state along with the client.
Oh, right, right. Um, so the last client, I, I made him draw pictures. I often make them go home for ho everybody’s got homework. Uh, Mil Erickson taught us you have to give homework to everybody each time. Gotta give ’em homework. And, um, and, uh, you know, Dr. Mil Erickson and, and I had the n L. I took that for years before.
And, and, uh, so you make ’em draw, you make ’em draw pictures of themself as they used to be, and pictures themself as they wanna be in the queer and queer image they have in themself as they wanna be, or as they’re becoming, as they’re becoming, the easier it is for them to actually become that, to act as if.
This piece is theirs. So, so they’ll sit down, I’ll go through the basic, you know, depending on what our beginning is, the quantum focusing, um, beginning with the, you know, getting to shut their eyes and do a little five minute thing they can take with them where, um, they, they, you know, look at a object. I pick a, a symbol of some kind and make that simple meaningful for them.
I have a whole box of symbols. And um, and then see, cuz I know about who they are, so it’s gonna process that way and then shut their eyes and go through. Eye epilepsy may or may not be appropriate. And, um, and, and have them, uh, close their eyes and either eyelids and your eyelids close. And notice it’s not your eyes, it’s your eyelids because you’re creating before you screen of mind, um, as you examine deep within your own, uh, body, the mysteries of human life, examining deeply the mysteries of your own life.
And then get ’em into breath. That breathing on purpose, I, I bring everybody into breathing on purpose cuz breathing is something you do wherever you go. And you can create your own energy format with the breathing. Uh, breathe out longer than you breathe in. Your body naturally relaxes. Breathing in self-confidence, breathing out self doubt.
Uh, your body, your breath is becoming cleansing, breath. Um, and then allegories about throughout their body, how the oxygen is circulating and breathing in is, you know, bringing it in energy and, and, and oxygen healing, and breathing out, you know, negative thoughts. Depending on who they are. So it, it’s pretty versatile, depending who they are, but perhaps that constant breathing and I’ll give them breathing exercises to go with.
And breathing is just a amazing talk about just a, a guaranteed way for somebody to feel better and feel control of their own life. You know, it’s like a tornado going around, you know, there’s the eye of the tornado and it’s peaceful inside that eye, and that’s where you are. And your office has got all that chaos going around and, uh, been inside yourself.
You know, you are the eye of the tornado, you are the piece and you’re watching everything. Um, and, and then if they, I, I ask most clients to see me about a half a dozen times. I, I’m looking for someone I can work with about a half a dozen times, ask for minimum three times. I want a half a dozen times to work with somebody cuz then I can teach ’em witnessing consciousness.
And witnessing consciousness where you watch yourself, you watch your thoughts, you watch your thoughts as they go by. Well, if you watch your thoughts as you go by and you pick the thoughts that you act on, well, there’s no anxiety. And when you watch yourself as you go by, suddenly you’re alive in this world.
People don’t see themselves alive in this world. They, they’re in their mind or someplace else, and whoa, bring ’em into the actual world that they live in. The here and the now and the present, who they are standing here. It’s an awakening. The words woke, I’ve been told the awakening. Of what’s going on.
Yeah, I got a kid who says, I feel lit, I feel woke. So beautiful. Answer your question yet. I love it. I love it. Especially the themes of, again, bringing the client through that experience and, uh, letting it become something much more organic inside of them. Um, before you wrap up, Alan, where can, uh, I’ll link to some of the books over in the show notes, uh, with this, uh, with this program here.
Where can people check you out online? Where can they find you? Oh, alan barski.com. It’s pretty easy. Yeah, and I, I think I have about 15 mindful-hippotherapy.com and, and other domains. But no, A barski.com is the easiest way to find me. And, uh, you can spell my name, you can find me. Here we go. It’s some outstanding videos there as well, and a so awesome having you on here.
Hey. Hey, Jason. Thank you so much. What a way to start the day.
Jason, Lynette here once again, and as always, thank you so much for leaving your positive reviews online, sharing it on your social media streams. And again, check out Alan’s website, hypnotherapy-marin.com, and also head over to hypnotic workers.com. That’s the all access pass to my hypnosis training library.
Jump in, sharpen your technique, get greater results with your clients. I’m Jason Lynette. See you soon. Thanks for listening to the Work Smart Hypnosis [email protected].
