Session #336: Anthony Faiano on Victory Mindset

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This is the Work Smart Hypnosis Podcast, Session number 336. Anthony Fianno on Victory Mindset. Welcome to the Work Smart Hypnosis Podcast with Jason Lynette, your professional resource for hypnosis training and outstanding business six. Sets. Here’s your host, Jason Lynette. I am so excited for you to hear this conversation with Anthony Fi, who’s out of Pennsylvania here in the usa, to hear his background with many years of service in the military and a passion for how people produce change, how people solve problems, and even better, how it is that people take action.

In their own lives. Uh, the reason I invited Anthony to this program is that, again, many of you may already be inside of another career, another path, and there’s an interesting nuance in this conversation here with Anthony, that there’s a specific timeline. Already laid out in terms of when one career will come to an appropriate end to really free up the time to launch something very different moving forward.

This is a conversation that often I get into with people inside of hypnotic business systems, or even some of the folks I do private consulting with One to one. It’s this idea that we have to completely shut down one. To launch another, and briefly a bit of a personal story. First I allowed myself to incubate, is the phrase that I now stand by.

I was coming out of the career working in backstage production and professional theater, and I had a window of about maybe nine months where we knew the move to Virginia was imminent. And over time, I was gonna be leaving that theater career and going full time in hyp. having this in mind, I spent the next nine months taking whatever trainings I could fit into my schedule, working on my websites, beginning to produce content, creating the basic infrastructure of my business, which is where as we moved then at that point, from Maryland down to Virginia, only about an hour and 15 minute, uh, move or so by the time I landed.

At that time, all I had to do was find an office and I already had a fully established business. Even better. Oh, there was a waiting list on the website now taking, uh, names for a waiting list for upcoming appointments, and I was able to broadcast a message to that audience of people who had already expressed they wanted more from me.

And I bring this up in relation to the conversation you’re about to listen to here with Anthony, because in many ways he’s been somebody who’s been embodying. Already working, already helping a ton of people and building everything at over. So it’s gonna be this seamless transition over time. I knew this was a story that’s gonna be beneficial to many of you out there.

You could head over to the show [email protected]. We’ll make it easy for you. This is episode number 336, so just go to work smart hypnosis.com/ 3 36. That’ll bring you directly over to the show. To see more from Anthony and how to get in contact with him while you’re there. Check out hypnotic business systems.com in terms of growing your own successful business, making these transitions.

It’s a whole lot easier. It’s a whole lot faster with strategies that actually work. Inside of our industry, as much as I’m the person who likes to say business is business, what we do is a bit unique and off the beaten path. So when you have the right words in the right order at the right time to express the value of what you do as a hypnotist.

It’s a whole lot easier to attract that ideal audience and bring them in as your clients. You can check that [email protected] though again, a free preview is available with a presentation you could watch on demand, six steps to a six figure hypnosis business. You can get that right now by going to jason webinar.com and with.

Let’s jump directly into this week’s conversation. Here we go. Episode number 336. Anthony FAO on Victory Mindset. The first time I was introduced to hypnosis, I was in the Air Force. It was around 2000 and. I was, let’s say, working hard and playing way too hard, and so I decided I needed some hobbies, took myself to a pawn shop for a guitar on the counter.

Was a book Had to hypnotize your friends. I, I couldn’t pick it out of a lineup today. I read it. I used the one script in it. My friends were aircraft mechanics in the military. They were not the kind to make you feel good about yourself. and my first friend dropped right in. I started modeling his hands.

I started snapping in front of him. He wasn’t responding. And then I told him that the water underneath his chair was gonna be beer for the rest of the night, and he would. Think it was the best tasting beer ever. And I was like a kid playing hide and go seek that you’re in the room. And he’s behind the couch giggling cuz I was, I was almost giggling with how exciting this was.

he wakes up, he starts drinking this water and won’t let anyone take it out of his hand. Mm-hmm. . And is convinced that the tap is the keg, the tap water is the keg and all night. So I thought, man, that’s. We do like to paraphrase that as the official professional moment of, Holy shit, it’s actually working.

Well, that was the beginning of it. Yeah. So the, the actual moment is when a, a woman came up to me, uh, one of the women that I knew, and she said, Do you mind if I pause that story for a second? Because I wanna go back. Because Air Force engineers, right? Crew chiefs, crew Chief mechanics. Yeah. But I mean, clearly these are, uh, analytical people who require special techniques and are hard to hypnotize.

They’re also people who like to make fun of you for failing. So then I was being tongue and on the expectation of that one , trust me, they were waiting for me to fail so they could make fun of it. Yeah. When it worked, we were all kind of shocked, but. When this woman came up to me and asked me to get rid of her fear of crickets out of all things, that’s why she never hung out at night.

But nobody knew that. She said, Can you help me? And of course I said, Yeah, absolutely. But I had no clue what I was doing. Mm-hmm. . And so I just imagined what it would be like if I had a fear, what would I need? I need to hold it. I need to see them, but not have a reaction. So in that moment, all I did. I hypnotized her according to the script.

And then I just gave her that experience. When she came out of it, she immediately went outside looking for crickets. She had no fear of them. Nice. And that was the moment I thought, I can really help people with this. And so I just started reading. So it was 2000. So I was going around looking for PDFs that somebody would’ve thrown up online and I could read it.

And I got as much as I could until, you know, moving on to the first hypnosis academy that I was exposed to. So I, I love that nuance though, of just the chance encounter of going to the thrift store, looking for the guitar, and here’s a book. Uh, and I know you said you can’t really pick out the book the same way that one of the first things I ever found, it was horrible and I wish I still had it.

Uh, but the language was, memorize these words that ought to work. And okay that to, to the credit of that book, sometimes the lesson of what not to do is the lesson of what to actually do. And I went, I need to actually learn the language beneath this. And that may be why. You know, so much of what I do now is the fascination of this word versus that word.

And why you may not remember the exact book. Can you remember like some of the themes of what that induction may have been in terms of Absolutely. Yeah. Go. I remember it started at the top of a flight of steps. Yep. When I would ask the person to imagine about halfway down those steps was a colorful, relaxing mis that you were gonna walk into.

So it was almost a reverse progressive muscle relaxation. Every step made you go deeper in, into that state. And then once your feet were in it, then you can feel, move up to your knees. And then it was a, a, some, some sort of progressive muscle relaxation. Until you were fully immersed, you could feel that there was a door to your right and through that door was the beginning of whatever you were gonna get into.

Yeah. Yep. Nice, nice. I’ve heard the anecdote that often we end up falling back on the stuff that got us started. Are you still using traces of that at all these days? I use what my, when, if I can pick up, um, my client’s expectations. If they come in here and said, So you’re gonna relax my whole body, right?

Like start at the top, go to the bottom. I am going to do a progressive muscle relaxation. I’m gonna meet their expect. I’m not gonna show off. The tendency is like, well actually check out this instant induction. I just learned, you know? And then you go your break rapport. So I, I didn’t wanna do that. And, and the one lesson I learned that I take with me from that book is I was helping people before I actually knew what I was doing.

Yeah. And I don’t have to overthink this process. This is supposed to be something fun and creative and help somebody at the same time. And that’s what’s brought me into it, even. Yeah. So then from the sudden discovery of she’s out there looking for crickets and naming them and keeping them as pets, I’m sure.

Uh, what was the next step along that journey then, in terms of going further into it? Reading books, Um, I realized a lot of the books that the library had or that I found in self-help sections. Didn’t give me what I was looking for. It talked about more philosophical, this is how hypnosis works, and at the same time, how do I make that happen?

So I started to overcomplicate it in my mind, and then I ran into the Mike Mandel Hypnosis Academy and signed up for that and really got a structured look at things. And shortly after getting that, I found you. And that’s, that is when the whole journey. Seeing somebody that lives so close to me having a successful business in this.

It’s one of those things where you think back to high school and you go, Nobody ever told me I could do that. Yeah, I would’ve done that. Yeah. Thank you for that. And let, let’s look at the strategies inside of that though. I’m curious to ask the over complication, and that’s something that I kind of found this window of time, probably 2012, 2013, of catching the places where.

I was, and this is where the whole theme of work smart Hypnosis came from, of adding stuff to the process that really didn’t have to be there expecting that certain rules had to be followed in almost a rigid structure. Can you, can you think of any of those complications that you realized you were able to take out?

Well, listening to Freddy Jack, I think it was on your podcast. The Jack winds seem to want to simplify everything towards bare bones. Yeah. And there’s a lot of art that goes into that, and I’ve seen none of the academies, I wouldn’t say the mm h a or yours, or a lot of the trainings I’ve taken. I seek that simplification of the process.

I seek the freedom in building those things. So I haven’t run into too much of that. I, I guess the closest thing would be kind of, Progressive muscle relaxation stigma. I know the intention is to get away from just that and to have, you know, a more robust way of meeting your client’s needs. However, I, I felt like it was a little demonized in the beginning.

Mm-hmm. . And I think, yeah. I don’t think we need to demonize it. There’s a time and place for it. Like, there is other things. If, if that’s the expectation of your client, why deny them? It’s, it’s a very easy need to. Yeah. One of the greater benefits as I look at something that I heard Michael Elner say many years ago was that he goes for anything, stress, for anything, pain, for anything that’s bothering your client to simply do that creates the opening in which now change can occur.

Yes. Uh, so, So to ask yourself instead of this technique versus that technique, Well, what does this serve and what will it be helpful for? Or even with that one, you know, I, I kind of defaulted to go, well, I will say I do prefer an alman induction because, It’s a give and take. There’s interaction the entire way through, but now I can use the PMR as a technique inside of the session to satisfy a different point.

Sure. You could use it as a deepener. Yeah. I mean, Elman’s great because of the, the feedback it provides, the person doing it, the, the, it’s loaded with. Everything you would want in an induction. I, I do think that’s quite the standard. And to, just to mention something that you’ve done with it. Uh, the mental relaxation.

People like to play games with that part. Uh, some of the clients I’ve had like to see if they can just keep counting down and I, I know what they’re doing, but writing your name in the sand and having the waves come and, Oh yeah, that is money. That is money. Because they disappear every time and they. I’m mentally relaxed now.

Yeah. And credit to actually, I think I heard Don Moten do that. Okay. Uh, many years ago. And so then looking at this journey of now going off, taking one training, taking another one to kind of refine the skills we live by the Scott Sandlin line of not necessarily learn from people who disagree with each other, which, just ten second anecdote there.

There was someone in a Facebook group the other day trying to pit this training versus that one, and I’m like, I just have to swoop in and just call out the fact you realize we’re all friends. And we like each other and we send people to each other’s trainings and we all say nice things about each other.

You’re putting a presupposition of competition. That’s just not the case. , absolutely. We all sit in each other’s workshops and cheer each other on and say, Oh, go take this person’s thing. But by having the education, I’m curious to ask you, coming from another career, can you talk a bit about some of the transition to, to get out there and start to do this for.

Absolutely. Uh, coming from a military career just under 22 years in the Air Force. Yeah. And, you know, aircraft mechanic. Then I was an admin. I had broken my back. I was an admin and I was happy to get out cause I knew I was gonna be doing something I loved to do. And I, I did get some. Because it’s, it’s victory mindset is a total hypnosis is my change therapy.

Yeah. But I offer coaching too, and I offer resilience skill building. Nice. And that is something I, I took from the Air Force. I was a master resilience trainer, and I would train on a set of skills that were research based to increase your resilience and bring your stress down. But what we learn in hypnosis is to de traumatize first.

And so having hypnosis in my tool, Really puts me above, um, not above, but it offers more. For the client to learn because we would you traumatize? Yeah, let, let’s branch off of that for a moment because I’d even call out, just as an example it, it’s where, because of the Hypnotic Language Hacks podcast, because of the influence program that I also do, there’s a different audience that’s now finding me in a different way.

Mm-hmm. , and they might be hiring me for consulting around the business and their different industries. Here’s an accountant I’m working with, Here’s a contractor. It’s that place where just like you said, the hypnosis satisfies a specific point where normally where there would be a block, now it becomes the, Oh good.

Let’s do something about that. Um, so, so where is it that you’re seeing the hypnosis fit in? What role is that satisfying differently than the other tools for you? Oh, well, somebody wants to come and learn how to be more resilient, right? They, they’re often stressed out already. They’re overwhelmed by life.

And then when I learn that actually, What’s happening for you? I ha I have one specific client I have in mind right now. What’s happening for you is you’ve had trauma in your past and we need to disconnect you from that. Yeah. So, because the reactions will help are bringing your stress level up, you feel like you don’t have control over your reaction.

So I want to teach you this resilience thing, but first, let’s get you nice and present, you know, and, and of course, by the time, one of the resilient skills is mindfulness. You’re gonna be a lot more mindful when you’re. Traumatized still. And so that it just, it makes the next step of any coaching process because ultimately I would imagine if I didn’t have it, I would run up into a wall with the coaching process and I wouldn’t have any tools to get around it other than just talking their ear off, which why not do it while they’re hypnotized,

So I say sometimes we just don’t wanna argue with the conscious mind. Let’s just Yeah. Get in there and resolve it. I, I love that theme. Of, you know, clearing away what’s there so that these skills will become even more effective. Now when you say resilience training, like who is it that you’re finding is responding to that?

Who is it you’re finding is seeking that out or discovering it and realizing that they want it individually? Right now it seems that single parents have been the ones to reach out for that, and usually within the first year or two of becoming a single parent, it, it could be very stressful to make that adjustment and.

They will teach this to their kids as well. Ultimately, uh, one of the parents will come in here and learn these skills and then go home and teach it. Now the nice thing is I’m used to giving it in a corporate setting with the military members and what I can do. For a corporation and I can create a team building exercise.

And the way it builds the team is it teaches people how to be more resilient. But at the same time, when we’re doing the exercises, we’re giving real examples from our life. Mm-hmm. . And I’m seeing people look at each other and say, I didn’t know that about you, man. That’s, And I see relationships begin the.

Based on common experiences that they never even knew they had. And so it’s a very deep team building exercise where you start seeing people hang out outside of work now people living, uh, you know, telling you I learned this thing and it’s helped my marriage. And that for an employer to be able to give that to their workforce, they’re gonna get people coming in less stressed and better moods, more in control of their life with goals and, and mm-hmm aware of their strengths, the things that they can do to feel comfortable and be.

Nice. That’s something that you’re doing in a group format, then it can be offered either way, it can be offered, uh, via coaching, um, individually or in a group format. Absolutely. Nice. Is that the messaging that you’re putting out then in terms of this is the service, this is the offer, Or is that what it then morphs into?

Like what’s the structure of how they’re then realizing this is what we’re about to do? This is what I’m seeking. At this point it’s going to be word of mouth. Yeah. My first client that, that brought me in for public speaking slash resilience is Proctor and Gamble, and they had me, me come in and and train their leadership on stress management, and of course I could incorporate.

These resilient skills. I could also incorporate some of the techniques that we learn in training. And they loved it, but then covid happened and they didn’t want anyone on their property, so, Right. Yeah. I’m still waiting to hear back. Um, I’ve been told that it, this will pick back up again at some point, so I’m, But you know, I, I’ve moved into a, a different area and I’m approaching those, I’m actually meeting a, uh, a business.

Uh, medical business for pain management. So I am a bit all over the place. It is my first year and I am, yeah. I’m actually learning more of what I don’t want to do, which again, he keeps coming up. But shout out to Scott Sandlin. Mm-hmm. . I listen to that episode. My office is inside a drug and alcohol rehab facility, uh, outpatient treatment.

It’s all counselors and my office is in the back and. They had me work with a couple of their people and oh boy, I, I think Scott May have downplayed how hard it is to work with certain addictions. It, and I don’t mean he downplayed it deliberately. I think he’s that good at it. Yeah. But, whew, I, it’s not the client that I’m looking for.

Oh, I think there’s something inside of this, which is that, and correct me on this, that, you know, there, there’s a specialty. In terms of, let’s say, service in terms of modality, that inside the coaching, here’s also the hypnosis. Mm-hmm. , here’s also the resilience training and, and that’s part of the specialty and.

Given the military background, when someone sees that people do business with people that they know, like, and trust. Yes. And it, it’s where, I mean, I can give the example of I had someone working in the office at one point, and if it was a person who was in the Navy, uh, I was able to say, I’m gonna have you work with him.

Well, I wanted you. Yeah. But he’s been through the same things and he’s gonna get the scenario. That’s why you’re gonna work with this person if there’s some sort of connection the same as you know. Here’s someone who mentioned some sort of more ongoing psychological disorder, and I would go, I’m confident I can help you.

However, here’s a psychologist in the area who’s a phenomenal hypnotist. Let me give you their information. Yeah, and I, you know, to the drug and alcohol side of it, I had briefly, um, I was not seeing them to come off of heroin, but it was a specific treatment center that as they were clean, they would share my name as someone as the resource to go for everything you’re looking to build.

He can help you to get there. And I was very clear on that role of going, I’m not seeing you for this side. That’s what that team is for. Uh, they’re working on what you’ve been through. I’m helping you with where you’re going, which is also what they’re doing as well. Sure. And there’s something to be found around.

We can do something enough to a point that we do realize eventually, Oh, that’s my special. Right. So that’s what I’m really good at. And likewise too, um, there are certain things that we do enough over time that you go, You know what, I’ve done that. And, um, it’s my business, it’s my sandbox. Uh, I don’t necess.

I had someone who called me for something, which, uh, let your imaginations go exactly where you’re gonna guess . At one point, I was the only male hypnotist in the area. So when someone calls up and says, Oh, Laura, over at this other practice sent me your way, and it was a male voice, Ah, yes, yes, I know where you’re going.

And now I look at it and go, Okay, I’ve done that quite a bit. And yes, we have. You know, they always make sure they’ve gone the medical route. Make sure they’ve mentioned the idea that they’re seeing a hypnotist for this. Sure. Uh, but I’m the one going, You know what, here’s three people I know who would be phenomenal.

And it’s not for any lack of confidence in helping with that issue. Right. It’s to say after, you know, 12 plus years, This is what I’m focused on right now. I thought you like this in your work . Um, I just send them to you. No. So to have that ability where we can say, this is what I do well. Um Right. And I think sometimes it’s a better choice to have done a bit of everything.

So it’s not just the one track mind. I’ve, I’ve wanted to niche. I’ve, I’ve listened to your stuff on, I’ve listened to a lot of people talk about it. , I will, however, you know, I have this, any hypnotist has this massive toolbox to, to work from. Yeah. And a lot of times it’s a matter of, boy, I really like working with pain clients because I like when they get up and they, and it’s gone and they do this little celebration in my office and, Yeah.

Yeah. No one tell everybody they know, you know, there’s just something magical about that. Um, and, but then, You know, and not every paying client will be the same. I, I just, I am right now just focused on helping as many people as I can, and of course, being honest with myself when it’s not my job to help them.

And, uh, and, and through that, through the experience. I will find a niche. I guarantee it. Well, there there’s a, there’s a sit on the fence place in the middle, and this is the official teaching position I have now, which is to say you can be that generalist if you go to the what still is, the Virginia Hypnosis website.

Mm-hmm. , of course. Named after Virginia Satir. We all know that, of course, broadcasting from Orlando. Uh, but if we can look at, you know, that site and yes, there’s two services that are prominently there for clients, and then there’s a dropdown with like public speaking and, uh, weight loss and other items.

The message is anytime you’re gonna broadcast something, niche down the message. We can have different broadcast streams. The metaphor is I if you’re blowing that dog whistle as soon as you’re okay, that you don’t want everyone running to one message. And the beauty of it is, here’s a webinar that brings in most of my clients right now, which is very much talking about business confidence, imposter syndrome, fear of failure, Um, and yet here’s a client who just came in for a fear of something very different.

She made the calculation, I bet he works with this. So we, we have that ability to broadcast, but it’s where if the opportunity comes up to be in a networking event, don’t do the anything and everything. Pick one specific. And when I go to networking events, it’s usually like, the one I’m going to tonight is for an orthopedic center.

Oh yeah. That’s clearly pain management. Know your audience. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Oh, hey, I can help you quit smoking to be like, what are you doing here? Yeah. I I definitely, when I’m out representing the business, I, I know my audience, although, Then again, um, big three, smoking, stress, weight. As soon as we remove any of those three, uh, comfort tends to increase.

Absolutely. And these are people who often are having to make the recommendation that, hey, here’s what we can do to help you out. However, if you would do this thing, it would help you even further. And they’re often in the place. Kind of like back to what you said around, you know, the coaching and the resilience training, that there’s a place where we kind of.

Get a block of just advice as to go, you should do this, and now here you are is the resource that now represents, I can also help you with that. Right? And, and educating the area is a big deal. There are some hypnotists up in Harrisburg, which is about 45 minutes from my office, but. Even the people in this town, I, I’ve realized after a year I will wear my, my shirt out and say, Have you heard of this?

Yeah. No. What is it? Is it a beer? I say, Well, not yet, but ooh. Right. Thanks for the business idea. But yeah. But yeah, so getting my name out there, I, I think my first year in business could be summarized as an education. Mm-hmm. , the paid education. And yeah. My second year I seek to establish myself. Um, now that I.

I have a great idea of how this works, and I’m, I’m only on the tip of the iceberg at this point. And, uh, once I establish myself, then the growth, you know? Yeah. So then what is working right now to bring people in? What is working right now for people to find you? Interestingly enough, uh, Instagram, which I’ve never had before.

I had a business. I put my random thoughts as I have them. Yeah. And I put them out there and people have said, I like, Your philosophy on things, and I wanna work with you. Yeah, that’s, that has been the bulk of my social media. I have a pretty good conversion rate for someone with not a whole lot of followers.

I’m about to open up a bunch of new stuff, stay tuned, um, . But for now, that, uh, Facebook ads did pretty good. I was on a podcast, a small business podcast for Central Pennsylvania, and boy, I was on that podcast and the next month my schedule was, Beautiful. And so just the exposure, because I opened a year ago under Covid.

It’s been very difficult. Now I’ve, I’ve gone to Harrisburg’s Rotary Club. I, I had a, a mentor one time. Tell me something about Rotary Clubs and, and educating the public on what we do. Yeah. About that. I think his initials were jail or something like that. I’m not sure. But, but it’s really worked out well because it’s put me in touch with some people who, Networked.

I mean, they’ve lived in Harrisburg their whole life. Their family has been business owners their whole life. And it’s just, Oh, we have this new person here and we’ve never had this before. Let’s see how we can use ’em. Mm-hmm. , And that’s the right audience who, once you present what you do, they’re already thinking of ways where you fit into their life.

Yeah. As soon as people realize, and this is one of those biggest elements we did in a, in a private community that I run, uh, there was someone who was running into a challenge. That they were focusing so much of their effort, building these sort of more long term strategies of videos that, you know, even with this podcast, it’s the long game that people, it took some years for people to start to really find it and really to take off.

Or even just putting things on a YouTube channel, and that always has to be balanced out. We did an episode on this years ago, and, uh, my amazing team of editors will now find the episode about, uh, active versus passive strategies and put it in the show notes for this episode. Uh, but that whole thing that.

We need to do both. And, and it’s a, it’s a balance over time that the stuff that, let’s call it out, seems to be a little sexier. Mm-hmm. , I’m gonna create a product and I’m gonna create a webinar and drive people through it to sell it. Yes. And that is the foundation of most of my business now. Right. Yet early on, we’ve gotta balance it out with Rotary.

One example, anywhere that people gather, look for built-in audiences and ask what can I share with them the same way? You’ve got the event tonight. Here’s what they’re gonna find value in. Um, You mean you’re not gonna do an all about hypnosis talk, Anthony? I’m not. Aw man. Will not . No. There’s so much more I have learned that the bigger picture, you, you can tell ’em about hypnosis, but if you zoom out a little bit and tell ’em where it fits in to their life or, or even using the shameless examples.

Names they recognize that have used hypnosis. When I’m talking to a school, I’m gonna talk about Mike Tyson having a hypnotist, and I’m gonna talk about Tiger Woods having a hypnotist. And if anyone’s thinking of getting accepted for a full ride to a college for sports, why wouldn’t you give yourself the edge?

Yeah. You know, and right there, I mean, using what’s current. Uh, my phone, oddly enough, is sitting off to the side right now, uh, which is where if anyone recognized the app, someone was sending me messages on Voxer and my sound was on. Uh, but right now, today as we’re recording, Tom Sereno, who’s been on this podcast, uh, for being on 90 day fiance, that’s got a whole bunch of, uh, Google alerts for the word hypnosis, but then 1, 2, 3.

Four news alerts about, and this movie came out a while ago, uh, Reese Witherspoon, Uh, Okay. Talking about using hypnosis to get rid of panic attacks for a certain movie that she filmed. Um, and again, use your industry as we stand on what’s around us right now, and, you know, let it be seen as you said, how this fits into the puzzle.

That that’s one of those biggest things to broadcast that message and amplify that as. Absolutely. And recently there was a song that was put out, It was a rap song of all things, and I caught wind of it and the rapper in that, uh, his name was Hobson, went through a pretty dark time and it was hypnotherapy that got him out of it.

I never knew that. And mm-hmm. , I made sure. I clipped that section of the song. I found him talking about hypnotherapy. He, he described it as the woman reaching into his soul and ripping it out of him and then cleaning it and putting it back. And I thought, Oh nice. I’m gonna put this on social media, . Yeah.

And you know, and I even sent him some messages, you know, thanking him for, Being so open about it because not many people will say that unless they’ve worked exact, You know, somebody who’s heard of somebody working with a hypnotist still maintains this level of skepticism. But somebody who’s worked with somebody who’s done the work often will just tell everybody.

That’s what I’m finding out. Nice. Nice. So let’s, let’s go to this then. Somebody is now working with you. Mm-hmm. and we’ll, we’ll leave it general for now, cuz I’m always curious to ask, is there a through line, is there a theme in terms of. Where the work has now gone for you, that you’re, you’re like many people that have come from different schools of thought, all of which do compliment each other and to use the word you also use the artistry comes then in terms of how we bring it all together, right?

So what’s kind of that user experience as someone’s now working with you? As far as what techniques do I prefer, like metaphors, It’s an intentionally vague question to see where you take an answer. It’s an artfully vague question. Look at that, right? . I was intentionally artfully. There you go. Yes. Very good.

I. Absolutely had no idea. I mean, I’ve heard it a million times in my training, the power of metaphors and, and boy, the metaphor can be the thing that tips the scales in their favor and in the favor of meeting their goal. The metaphor, the embedded commands, just the, So what we do is, I find the most important thing that I make sure I say specific things is that pre-talk, it’s another thing that you hear it in your training, but if you craft that pre-talk and I put so much responsibility on them in the pre-talk, it’s it almost, you know, it causes them to have to participate.

How do you do that? Okay, so they come in and they say, You’re gonna fix me, right? And they say, Oh yeah, it’s just like that. That’s what I do. You sit down, you go to sleep, and you wake up all better. And they say, Oh, okay, great. I So actually you’re gonna do some work too, . So I say hypno hypnosis is not mind control.

It’s not me taking control of your mind and fixing it for you, even though that’s, I know what you think is happening. This is how hard it’s gonna be. I’m, You’re gonna hear me talk to you the whole time. I’m gonna say, imagine you’re standing in a field and you’re gonna lay there in that recliner and you’re gonna do all that work of imagining you’re sitting there in the field and then your conscious mind could just go out to lunch.

And they said, I can do that. I said, Well, so it’s a thing we’re doing together. You understand that, right? So I can talk to you, but if you’re not gonna participate, you might as well just leave. And they say, Oh yeah, no, I’m in. Okay. And so I build, after I know there’s a rapport, I tell them, This is something fun and exciting we’re gonna do together.

I let them know there’s gonna be some things that happen during the session that might have you thinking, Wow, how is that happening? And that’s okay. You can just let that relax you even deeper. And then, and I just draw the conclusion during the pre-talk, so this is what it’s gonna look like. And I preframe their experience and say, Next time you open your.

After I tell you to close ’em, you’re gonna find that even if you wanted to smoke, even if you wanted to eat more than you should, it’s just gonna be impossible because you’re a new person. And the whole I, there’s a part of me that says the entire hypnosis session happens in the pre-talk, and then you act it out.

Yeah. And you hear these things in training, but in a real world situation, when you have somebody sitting there, You realize, why didn’t that work? Why, why wouldn’t they go in the hip? Oh, they thought I was doing it to them. I forgot to mention that. And then you really learned to craft that pre-talk, to have those things that highlight their experience.

And I’ll tell you, you don’t even need a double bind at this point. You’re the professional. They’re here that I’ve never done this before, half the time. And, and you walk ’em through it and it. It’s almost creepy to see them get out of that chair and just go off into life with this new way of doing things, which was exactly what you opened with, which that’s, that’s a thing that, and I’d say this from an instructor mindset.

That can be a hard thing to teach sometimes. Um, or at least it was until again, our good friend metaphor crept in to go, Oh, that’s how we do it. And I always go back to, and again, second time referencing him here, uh, Michael Elner, who I, I took some amazing courses from him. I traveled up to New York twice to just to go take a training with him and already knew him.

To the respect of the techniques he taught, you got results because you were in the room with him. Mm. And, and, and people would hear that now and go, Oh, because you knew who he was. Like, no, they, the people didn’t necessarily have the same prestige. It was that, as I’d characterize it, you were in a room with someone who, from the most loving perspective possible.

Refused to believe how solid and real that problem was. Hmm. You were in the space with someone who, cr And that’s something that I’ve brought into what I do that, Who was it? Marie Forlio I got mad at for the phrase, everything is figure, everything is figureoutable. I’m like, Damnit. I thought of that too.

You did it first and said it better. Uh, it’s a theme apparently with me. Uh, but this, this idea that there’s, you know, some sort of way around everything. Absolutely, and we can figure, and it’s again about creating that space where the stories, this is, you know, out of metaphor, this is where one of the things that I’m leading on this year is making sure people realize, especially with Metaphor, all of your stories serve a purpose.

And if you’re not intentionally choosing the stories, and this is painful to people, editing out the parts of the story that don’t serve the story. You know? Yeah. That’s where now we can get into it in a much deeper way and realize that, as you said perfectly earlier, this is where now we can lean into those embedded commands of the stories.

We can pull out those quotes and change that perceptual position and fire off an extremely direct command to somebody in the context of a story. And it’s about creating that space where as I brand it now, it’s conversational influence reinforced by hyn. It, It’s exactly, you’re right, you’re right about that.

And if it, if it’s okay, one of the metaphors that I had created for, Oh yeah, go for it. Smoking clients. I’d love to share it with your audience, please. So oftentimes when, uh, it’s happened a handful of times, but now I just incorporated this into the first session. I always saved it in case they came back.

But so the metaphor is, I want you to imagine yourself driving in a car and the person driving is that old friend. It’s a friend that’s been there for you. He’s been there in times of stress. He’s been there in times of fun. He’s been with you since you were whatever age they tell me they started and I said, But that friend’s keeping a secret from you and that friend.

Is gonna drive that car off a cliff. He’s driving you to your death. And so now I need you to take control. I need you to demand that the friends stop the car. So they stop the car and then I have them walk around, open the door and tell them to get out as they get in and take control back of that vehicle.

As they drive away, they look into the mirror and notice that that feeling that used to connect them to their friend has now been replaced by. That as they drive away, the feeling of comfort goes further and further as they get smaller and smaller. And until you’re fully into, I can’t go back and pick them up.

That’s a threat. They want me dead, and that’s the metaphor I give them and it just locks it in the place. Mm-hmm. . Which so many people would be the Yeah. But it was my friend. Yeah. But this thing supports me and, you know, we can sit there and the, the mind will sometimes butt up against advice. Mm-hmm. . But now to paint that story inside of, uh, inside of a metaphor, it’s a very different response.

Um. I have a slightly inappropriate version. Do you wanna hear it? Of course. Okay. So the disclaimer is always to credit the comedian, John Malanney. Uh, you can curse as long as it’s a quote. Absolutely, because then I’m not saying anything offensive at any way whatsoever. But it’s where if I ever hear any traces of, uh, well, it’s my friend, it was there to support me.

Well, you know, a couple of years ago I did have someone who came in and she sat there for a moment and I could see, I could pinpoint the moment visually where she quit smoking. And it was in the conversation where she says, Yeah, but it’s my friend. And then I saw this shift occur and I hadn’t done anything yet.

And she goes, But then again, I realized my friend was best friend in real life, was sleeping with my husband. So I got rid of her. I got rid of him. Might as well get rid of the cigarettes too. And I’m just sitting there wide eyed like you really just said. Awesome . You’re like, Well, we’re done. You can go.

Yeah. It’s like, and close your eyes and take everything, you know, solidify it and open your eyes. You’ve got this. Um, that’s amazing. We, we did the work. But again, you can catch that moment. And, and, and I always wanna stress this. It’s not for the sake of, here’s another technique. It, it’s instead this place where it’s the texture.

This is what we call compound. That we can drop a story in the pre-talk intake conversation. We can reiterate a story during the session as well. Is there a time that you’ve had something happen with a client? Look to Universalize, What happened as a technique you can use with others? I don’t, I don’t necessarily think I do have a specific example of that.

Mm-hmm. . Yeah, that, that’s one that I sometimes hear of where again, we can model that success and create that space where just this is the place where this thing happens. Yeah, I just make sure it, it’s a lot of it. I put so much emphasis on the pre-talk. Yeah. Um, and the post hypnotic suggestions, just how I’m very careful how I talk to them.

I’ve, I’ve heard myself giving people embedded commands to undo everything. I just did on accident. How so? Uh, you know, Hey. Don’t go out there and light up a cigarette when you get out there, you know what you do now. It’s like, what did I just say that for ? Why wait, come back in here. I gotta start. No wait, Mulligan, come back.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that’s, you know, one of those things, just making sure that the pre-talk is appropriate. But I will say this and what I’ve learned with metaphor and trusting your own artful skill to take the principles and create something that’s authentic to you. Because if you do. You’re not likely to break rapport because that also has a piece of you in it, and if you establish rapport being yourself, then the metaphors having that piece of you in it are only gonna continue to enhance that rapport.

Yeah. Which, that goes back to what you said was working for you in terms of, you know, Instagram. And the same is true of any online platform. I, I’d be very open. About how a big chunk of my business changed, thanks to not just the fact that this podcast goes out to a larger international audience than what the local practice used to.

It was where, and you can play this game by finding videos online, where at one point there was a more put on professional demeanor of Virginia hypnosis and there was the more laid back with work Smart. And it’s as the two mesh together as one. And it wasn’t having to turn on In an episode a couple of weeks ago with Kevin Lapine, he talked about how, you know, a performance style of taking those aspects of you and just simply elevating.

You know, in terms not just being someone else, but I’m taking these parts of me and letting that be the focus. Is there a story that kind of stands out though in terms of kind of the same way that the hypnosis journey began? The, Oh wow, it’s working. She’s looking for the crickets. Yes. Is there a story that comes to mind of working with someone where, let’s say even you were surprised Yes.

Of the change. It was one of my first clients. The person came in here, migraines, Uh, but. My mother had migraines growing up. Nothing like this. This is debilitating. Think of a redhead that will get a migraine anytime they flush. Okay? Mm-hmm. , that’s not a good combination of things. Yeah. Um, heat. This person was passionate.

I mean beyond passionate about working out, would work out and know they’re gonna be down for a day or two with migraine. Mm-hmm. was on every medicine, tried everything, couldn’t go out in the sun, couldn’t get embarrassed, couldn’t work out. Life was miserable. And they came in here and just, I got in the beginning.

I got a lot of this is I, I’ve tried everything, you know, and I went at it with such confidence. I’m like, Listen, this is gonna do it for you. Don’t worry about it. I know this is gonna work. I, I’m a hundred percent confident. And then what I saw a change in her was that she got excited, right? So we went.

Back and forth, and it wasn’t until the second session, but then after the second session, we’re talking, working out twice a day out in the daytime. No problem. I mean, putting up videos on social media of, of the workouts. They were intense and I, they were all high intensity workouts and I thought, really, Oh my gosh.

Like this is a person who could barely drag themselves into my office and I’m watching this person just give it everything they got. And that person expressed massive gratitude for essentially getting their life back. Yeah. Can you recall some of the strategies you used in that? Ooh. Uh, in a jack order and illness, Anything?

Absolutely. Control room. Yeah. , I used Jacqueline’s strategy on the first session, and it had nothing to do with migraines. Uh, it was just a hunch. It was, it had something to do, uh, with the, uh, dream architecture. Just to get rid of the limiting beliefs that were associated with it, that this will never change.

And then the second session was where I did the work on the pain itself. Mm-hmm. . So that was the control room, the time machine. I went back to the younger self to walk her through it and tell her how excited she was gonna be, that this is never gonna happen again for these reasons. Yeah. And the reason I did the work, the second session was waiting for the doctor to get the.

After the first session. Mm-hmm. via a letter to the doctor. So didn’t wanna start the work there until Yeah. The doctor was on board. That’s a, that’s a really great thing to highlight there, Anthony, that you know, and, and this is something that we consistently say, and I say it too, you know, get the referral, get the connection, get at least the acknowledgement that they don’t see any conflict in doing it.

But realize we can still work with that person. We can just work on them, work with them from a different, Yes. Uh, and, and it’s not to say, Oh, get clever and reframe it and find a way around it. No. You worked on, If you had to characterize that first session, what was that sort of through line of that one limiting beliefs that Yeah, it would always be this way.

Yeah. Took care of that in whole, and you know what, If I had to do it all over again, I think that’s a, that is how I would approach it. Around chronic pain is a limiting belief that I’m always gonna feel this way. Yeah, well, I’d say around so many issues that true, you know, you’re talking to that person for quitting smoking.

Well this is what it always is in the morning. Mm-hmm. and story. Uh, well, there’s this guy Jess, who came to see me and he was around two friends of his, uh, he had quit smoking with me and he found out that these two friends were gonna get the deck knocked off the back of their house. This is weird because they were convinced they were to quit smoking together on New Year’s and they went, We can’t go back there ever again.

Um, so they’re just gonna get knocked off and he’s like, You guys, that’s stupid. I met with this hypno guy. He can fix you. Which is not the right term, but Right. They came in, uh, they sent me a nice Christmas card. The two of them toasting wine glasses in the back porch. Exactly, Exactly. We can create that reality.

Where again, well, what if there’s another option? Here’s that’s how. This is how we can create that. Right? And there’s no guessing. If these people are ready to quit, they’re ready to knock piece of their house off. Okay, you’re ready. Come in. So just to call something out, we were chatting about before we hopped on here, that having launched the business and being profitable in year one, which that’s great.

Doing that and launching during a global pandemic. Nicely done, sir. Uh, but I’m sure that’s giving some nice intention towards a refocusing. I know you were talking about putting out a new website in the coming soon days. Where is kind of that focus right now in terms of now moving things? So right now I’m working on an online presence that is going to create more of a community based around victory mindset as far as redesigning the website and bringing more content to people for free.

It, I, I’ve wanted to do that. I’m, I’m strategizing what would be beneficial. We’ve shifted from the pandemic mindset now to, Hey, things are opening up. A lot of people are, have developed a lot of stress about going back in public. Being around other people so much, going back to work, going to university after, you know, being locked up for a year.

And so more of the stress management, more of the anxiety, um, getting rid of people’s anxiety essentially. Yeah. Nice. Those type of things. And really starting now to make a push into public speaking because things are opening up that was just kind of shut down and I was just waiting. Mm-hmm. . Yeah, I, I did some online public speaking for the chamber and stuff like that.

It’s definitely not the. Yeah, so having those opportunities. That’s great. Where can people find you? How can they best get in contact with you? Well, they can go to victory mindset.net if they want to, uh, shoot me a message. They can find me on Instagram at underscore Victory Mindset, or they can find me on Facebook at the Victory Mindset.

Awesome, and we’ll link to all that in the show notes [email protected]. Anthony, it’s awesome to hear what you’ve been doing with all of this. Getting out there helping a ton of people, and especially to share your story from another career, making that jump, especially loving the themes of resilience and what that means to people, especially to overuse a phrase that’s already been overused now more than ever.

Uh, before we wrap it up, any final thoughts for the listeners? You know, I, I know your audience has made a lot of hypnotherapist, hypnotists, and as a community, the idea of taking us into, quote unquote, the mainstream, or at least the people having us as a viable option. I, I just think that staying current, having the empathy for your client and just really being that resource for the community.

Where a lot of communities don’t have us as a resource, and so developing yourself into the best hypnotist you can be so that when you get clients, as you said, you can specialize in one thing, but people will still be interested if you can help ’em with other things. So staying curious, just stay curious as.

What is next? What else can I help with? Jason Lynette here once again, and as always, thank you so much for subscribing to this program, leaving your reviews online and exploring the back library. Hey, we’ve been doing this thing for more than seven years, so chances are if there’s someone you want to hear more from, we’ve probably had them on.

And likewise too. Even better, getting strategies to grow your business and help you to thrive inside of all of this, you can check out the show [email protected] slash 3 36 to see how to interact with Anthony, and you can also check out hypnotic business systems. Dot com. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel.

Model what actually works with proven strategies to help your business thrive and survive in any economy. Check that out. Hypnotic business systems.com though. For a free preview, watch the on-demand presentation, Six Steps to a six Figure Hypnosis Business. Get it right now at Jason. webinar.com. Thanks for listening to the Work Smart Hypnosis Podcast and work smart hypnosis.com.